PBL Tutor Training in Nepal

Joan and I completed our PBL Tutor Training workshop here in Nepal on Friday. It was a 2-day 16 hour workshop. We had 14 physicians participating, mostly from Patan Hospital. They are all possible tutors for the next block.
It was a very interesting experience. I think that patience has really arisen as something that I need to always keep in mind here in Nepal.
I think that both Joan and I are people who like to be early and prepared well ahead of time. so of course we met at the hospital at 7:15 am for the 8 am start. Joan was even thinking that we might not have enough time! Time has a very different meaning in Nepal...
The doors were locked to the room that we were going to use, the projector would not work - it would not advance the slides. we got started AT LEAST 1 hour later than expected. There was only 1 participant present at 8 am.
Anyway, we got started and found that this was a very eager and enthusiastic group! There was a lot of great questions, we had some great discussions and they wanted to now all about PBL. They were very familiar with PBL and the overall idea of the method. This helped a lot!
Our mock students were interns who came during lunch. Joan and I had to train them before they were to take on their role. They were EXTREMELY quiet and reticent and preoccupied. We hoped for the best!
Thankfully, Shambhu offered to act as the experienced tutor with the interns as a demonstration for our trainees. We had 6 interns (we were supposed to have 12 so we could split the group into two) so we had them sit at a table with Shambhu as the tutor while the trainees sat in a circle around them to watch. I couldn't have been more thankful that it was Shambhu in there and not me! And not Joan! The interns were beyond quiet. They simply wouldn't speak. Shambhu did an amazing job getting them to do anything at all. I was sortie that'd is would terrify our trainees, but it was great for them to see what can happen and what can go wrong.
After the interns left and we were debriefing, they came back to ask if they could return on Sunday instead of Friday for the training. Too funny! Shambhu explained that this was a training program and that they had to return the next day for 1 hour to help us again. They were worried about an exam that they had to write... So it was no surprise at all when they did not show up on Friday! We had no mock students!!! We didn't even know it until lunch was over. We were hoping and hoping that they would come.

Anyway, it all turned out well and we graduated 14 new PBL tutors! I was so thankful for having Joan and Shambhu with me! As usual it was sad to leave the people that we met in the workshop.

I went home feeling terrible with my cold, spent my day off getting over it and delivered my first PAHS-SOM lecture today!

Very exciting!